I'm just starting on my first mod and I'm decompiling some player models to get a feel for it and learn from the ground up.

- 1 -
when i decompile the phymodel.smd it's looking for a "phy.bmp" texture...anyone know where this might be? since i need a texture for compiling, i'm reckoning on using a 16x16 "phy.tga" with alpha set to 0%. since the texture wont be seen in game. am i totally off the mark here?

- 2 -
when i first make my animation, how should i be going about it? I know the animation is exported with the skeleton (ValveBiped_Bip01_Pelvis). the question is what is the best way of animating that skeleton? do i import a reference?

- 3 -
when i want to compile a set of 5 various animations. one of them is a "grab" action. so i have my;

Phy.bmp can be anything as when you create a physics model you need to have just some sort of texture assigned to it, just create an empty file and call it "phy.bmp".

Well animating with the Valve biped skeleton is something I have not done as yet, but the best way to animate is to set the skeleton with an IK set so you can animate much more naturally.

I have tried once to set the skeleton with an auto IK via Maya (Add Fullboyd IK) and it kinda worked, but it didn't work perfectly. I haven't looked at animating bipeds since.
So you're best bet is to start by fooling around with that.

I can recommend you some excellent training videos targeted towards HL2 Source Modding.....I've bought some myself and highly recommend them. The small company is literally making them for every poplular 3d application which includes XSI Mod Tool, Maya, and 3dsMax....you can grab them at

I can recommend you some excellent training videos targeted towards HL2 Source Modding.....I've bought some myself and highly recommend them. The small company is literally making them for every poplular 3d application which includes XSI Mod Tool, Maya, and 3dsMax....you can grab them at

1) First off if you're using maya I do believe 7.0 and above get pralls maya .smd exporter, it's the only one that can export the vertex animation type file for facial expressions.

2) Anyway, export .smd and check off the export animation flag. Go to the animation tab and give your sequence a name and input the start and end frames you will be exporting. Instead of putting the reference model name in the name of smd field put in the the name of the sequence.

3) The animation is a skeletal animation meaning it contains no mesh data, all the mesh data is found in the reference model smd. The skeletal animation is referenced in the qc file with a line like this:

where the $sequence declares the referencing of the animation
the Name you would like to call the sequence as read from modelviewer
The directory where the uncompiled reference model and animation smds are to be found
ACT_JUMP is a reference to the activity name this is necessary for the code to call up the animation(this is a large tutorial in and of itself)
-1 is if it's the only one of its kind 2,3,4 would be varieties thereof again a code thing
and finally the frames per second the animation should playback at
you could also ad loop to the end to make it do a playback loop and I think there are a few other options.

In the exporter the add to the end of line stuff is if your compiling a QC automagically which never works quit right, in fact the texture export sucks to but ths exporter in terms of getting the job done through maya kicks ??? it only took me three weeks to get it working. There's some code needing changing in the export script for vta exports, it's a pretty basic change:

I'm no expert, but is it possible to check which coordinate system points up when exporting?

And referencing regarding your previous post, in Max we export/import socalled biped-files (BIP-files). Made something called "funny walk", but I know just as much as you about how to export through and make it into Valve's modelviewer. And I think it would be right to export it seperately from the mesh-data. Maybe this has something with the choreography-thing they have in modelviewer?

The gun should be weighted to the Anim_Attachment_Hand that it should be in. If you don't have an anim_attachment add it (name: Anim_Attachment_LH or RH.) In maya this would be a bone with the hand as the parent, in XSI a NULL again with the hand as the parent. When you export the .smd with the mesh data delete the gun (or in maya you could just assign it to a layer) you'll want to join it to the model in code using EF_BONEMERGE or make the gun a standard pick up and have the engine deel with it. Then when you export the skeletal animation just export with the export animation checked off you don't have to change anything (eg. no deleting of mesh or anything.) Export the gun separately. It should be exported at a 0,0,0 reference point it's rotation again is set in code. Oh and the bone that you export the gun with should be named the same as the anim attachment it's attached to.

As for the y axis in XSI it seems to correct itself. In Maya I fixed it in the QC with the $UpAxisY but I had a problem with the physics mode not being oriented the same I assume I had to add the $UpAxisY to the collision model to but I'm not sure I switched to XSI before it became a problem.

thanks for the info Beky, I've noticed from looking at some of the HL2 animations in HLMV, that they seem to be sliding on the ground? is that done at compile time (animation made in the normal way, ie connected to the ground) or do i have to set up the sliding animation on the root joint. just curious on this part.

for example there is one called roofslide or something similar. any ideas?
thanks
Roxi

If you animate the slide then you'll have to compensate for the difference between origin and distance traveled when returning to an idle or a walk, otherwise it will snap back to the origin it started from. You could plant the feet and then animate the expressions and gestures made during the slide, then have the model slide across the floor in code by setting the players velocity; give it a good logarithmic function to drive its value.